Industrial Bots to Awaken Mom-Pop Manufacturing

Automated robots have inspired the human imagination for centuries. And they've not only existed in imagination. Automata -- mechanical machines that move on their own -- have a long history, frequently as toys. Yet from early on, we've seen the potential in robots. Indeed, in ancient times, Hero of Alexandria, an engineer and mathematician, wrote Pneumatica and Automata, two books that talk about the existence of hundreds of different kinds of wonder machines capable of automated movements.

21st century automation
Automotive and semiconductor manufacturing are no longer the exclusive uses for industrial robots. Technology and artificial intelligence (AI) advances have made it possible for robots to enter new production segments, making them indispensable in manufacturing applications.

Automation is no longer an option but a need for efficient industries. Recent figures suggest that this is an increasing trend in robot sales, and research on AI is rapidly finding ways to increase the autonomy of robots, giving them the power of decision-making and emotional capabilities. Both robotics and AI research and applications are advancing at such a fast pace that it is only a matter of time before well trained robots are ready to assist humans in areas like healthcare.

Robots to conquer the global market
According to the International Federation of Robotics (IFR), a non-profit industry group based in Germany, there were 179,000 robots sold worldwide in 2013, a new global record. The announcement was made by Arturo Baroncelli, President of the International Federation of Robotics, early this month at Automatica 2014, the 7th International Trade Fair for Automation and Mechatronics held in Munich.

Of those robots, 36,560 were sold to China, overtaking Japan for the first time. Japan took second place, buying 26,015 robots, and the US took third place with 23,679. This means an increase of almost 60 percent against 2012 by China alone, making it the biggest market for industrial robots. The European market grew by 5 percent in 2013, accounting for more than 43,000 robots.

Some of the reasons Baroncelli mentioned for the trend toward an accelerated automation include:

The need to increase energy efficiency and better use of raw materials

The need to increase productivity and quality due to global competitiveness

Growing global consumer markets and the need for creating greater production capacities

The increasingly shorter lifecycles and the increasing variety of products

A global growing awareness that robots have the capacity to improve the quality of work by taking over dull, dirty, and dangerous jobs, protecting the health of the workers

The International Federation of Robotics forecasts that industrial robots could hit a record of 200,000 robots sold globally by the end of this year, as shown below:

Source: International Federation of Robotics

Let's take a tour through the fascinating world of some of the planet's best representatives of industrial robots. Browse through the next eleven pages to learn more about these magnificent, highly efficient mechanical helpers of today's industries (or click on any image in this article at any time to go into a slideshow mode). Here, you will find an industrial robot for every need.

Industrial robots seem well-established at the hardcore end of industrial production where precision and reliability make it worth the cost, but it seems like they may be moving more into taking over the majority of manufacturing and maybe even a wider spectrum of jobs. Where are these models on the price range? How do they compare in terms of cost to a factory (or maybe even fast-food) worker?

@Larry: I think you have voiced a right set of questions! It would be just my guess that these robots are becoming more and more "affordable" if not cheaper so that these are seen fit for a wider spectrum of the industry other than manufacturing, where it has already taken a major role. In the video (I have enjoyed the video) it shows a wider variety of the work these things could do with speed, precision and power. With the increasing trend of business it is a mixed feeling - I am happy that the robotics industry is doing well, but on the other hand I am afraid that the robots would look more "profitable" as compared to human work force in a much wider spectrum of jobs.

"But reliable robots—especially ones required to work beyond the safety cages of a factory floor—have proved hard to make, and robots are still pretty stupid."

This is about to change, but not only because of improvent in sensors, etc. Researchers are working to make robots that can be decision-makers and some others with other human characteristics that will be helpful in various industries including healthcare.

I believe you will find interesting some articles I have written about AI and robotics that will be here soon.

That is a good point. 'This time is different' often doesn't work out that way. The key thing to realize is that things will march forward in spite of whether it is different or just another instance of the same.

@Susan: Thanks for your response!! I agree with you completely on the usefulness of Robots in making some of the tough jobs easier especially where health & safety of the worker is at risk...in a toxic environment, working in the furnaces, lifting heavy stuffs etc. My only worry is: will these human workforces get job somewhere else? Who is making sure that they are placed somewhere else?

And it's not only risk and dangerous jobs, it's mechanical jobs as well. Something that is so boring to do that is equally bad for workers and it causes them to make mistakes.

You asked: "will these human workforces get job somewhere else? Who is making sure that they are placed somewhere else?"

In the history of humanity we have seen situations like this one with robots quite many times. Workers either get jobs doing something else, like you can see in the video below, or they have to learn new skills to do some other jobs which require new skills as jobs will also change and new jobs that don't exixt right now will be created.

Now, the ones who need to be making sure that they keep updated and learn new skills are the workers themselves. They will get relocated if they adapt to the new demands in the factories and learn to work together with the robots, as a team.

In the video below we can see a factory where robots, including one of the spider-like ones from ABB that you saw in the slideshow, help in a pretzel factory. You can see that there are also workers needed in the process and this is something that is likely to continue.

For the company, it would be out of the question to have workers doing all the job as the process would slow down so much that the business would have to close down. There is no coming back to slow manufacturing in any industry. From here on, everything will speed up even more.

I enjoyed your post. I think emotions play a massive part in building inspiring and effective teams and I recently blogged on the secret sauce of team work. Rather than repeat it here I thought I'd post the link and I'd be very interested in your thoughts. gazo | friv 2 | Z6

" . . . but it seems like they may be moving more into taking over the majority of manufacturing and maybe even a wider spectrum of jobs."

If you look closely to what these industrial robots and AI systems do you will see that it's just about a change of who does what what they come to solve.

How many times we have heard horrifying stories about workers ending up suffering from irreversible health issues, in some cases life threatening illnesses because of the work they used to do.

Those workers dealt with toxic substances, gases, materials on a daily basis. Now all those jobs can be cafely done by robots.

Someone needs to keep see that everything is done and that robots are performing well. These are jobs that those workers can do now, among others.

The ROI of these robots is estimated in about a year, depending on the industry and the type of work they perform, of course.

Adopting these robots is cheaper for the manufacturer, factory, owner of the business, and safer for workers who will not risk their health and sometimes their life for a usually low-paid and risky job.

The adiption of automation also implies the need of new human skills. This is what workers need to focus on now.

@Susan, I completely agree in theory, but the reality of it on the ground will be more complex. There is already a return of manufacturing jobs to the US, but the jobs are programming the robots instead of actually working the assembly lines. Those jobs are preferable in a number of ways as you point out. They are safer, and they also pay better, but there are fewer of them and they demand a very different skill set. Eventually the market will adapt, as a new generation of workers grows into the skills required, but that doesn't happen overnight.

So far this has been a reasonable transition, or at least as reasonable as the complete revamp of a massive industry can be, but the rate of change is increasing. While the market is still going through this transition there is another right behind it. The current generation of industrial robots requires detailed programming, but the next will not. Labor shortages for programmers will make the new generation that much more attractive for manufacturers, speeding their adoption even more. Educating humans takes time, and the skills that they are learning could be obsolete before they get a chance to use them.

This could all eventually work itelf out into a much better environment, but there will be a lot of changes and change rarely happens smoothly.

"There is already a return of manufacturing jobs to the US, but the jobs are programming the robots instead of actually working the assembly lines."

I think it's good that workers still have jobs. They don't necessarily have to work in the assmbly lines if that is slowing down the nanufacturing process. Learning new skills is something that we all should all keep on doing to stay updated.

Another benefit of this change is that people will be forced to upgrade their knowledge, to study something new, to learn a new skill. This, as a whole, improves the level of the society, which is a good thing. With so many open, free courses online there is no real excuse for not learning something new.

We look back at history and it seems like a smooth, logical path as opposed to the chaos that we see around us in the present, but if you dig a little deeper you start to realize that chaos is the norm and it only looks logical after the dust has settled. Periods of high unemployment tend to be bad in terms of social unrest, so governments tend to find things for people to do. Large infrastructure projects are usually good for that, apropos to the initiative that Obama is starting now regarding upgrading and repairing our highways and bridges.

Education and retraining is a no-brainer for young and middle-aged workers, but it is a much harder proposition for older ones. At each age level there will be a percentage of people that are unwilling or unable to adapt (I once spoke to a new hire engineer right out of college who told me about how relieved he was that he didn't have to learn things anymore. I wonder where he is today?).